La Jornada:
"Fabian Sanchez, executive director of the organization Strategic
Litigation for Civil Rights (Idheas), and Adrian Ramirez, president of the
Mexican League for the Defense of Human Rights (Limeddh) stated that the 2012
World Report of Human Rights Watch (HRW) strengthens the call of international
and national organizations that the policy to combat crime be modified.

Despite repeated calls that have been made by international
organizations such as Amnesty International (AI), HRW, the United Nations (UN)
and the Interamerican Commission on Human Rights (IACHR), as well as national
human rights defense groups, Calderón persists in his position of not changing
his policy to combat organized crime. "There is no human power or national
or international instrument that can make the President change his strategy."

The report, Ramirez said, is important because "it
indicates that the strategy has exacerbated the violence in the country, and we
insist that the liability is Calderón's, because his policies foster a climate
of serious human rights violations." Fabian Sanchez added: "Although
the report does not state anything that is not known, it links the government's
strategy to worsening violence and reinforces the demand for a change in
security policy."

Mexican government
replies to charges made by Human Rights Watch

La Jornada: The
federal government, through the Interior Ministry, responded last night to the
accusations made ​​by Human Rights Watch World Report - 2012, presented Sunday in
Cairo. "The government rejects the accusations of HRW regarding human rights violations and
impunity of federal security forces. ....the work of the personnel of the Army,
Air Force and Navy of Mexico--in combating drug trafficking and organized
crime--is carried out in strict accordance with the framework of public safety,
attending to the particular problems that threaten the physical integrity of
the population and limit the carrying-out of the daily activities of
society."

In its press release, the Government argues that "the
actions of personnel adhers to the law, with full respect for human rights,
always putting first the security and integrity of the population,
strengthening the transparency and openness of the armed forces to report detailed
and reliable information regarding the completion of their assigned
missions."

Violence has
increased horribly in Mexico, says Human Rights Watch

Milenio: "The
organization Human Rights Watch reported that security forces in Mexico have
committed human rights violations and that the soldiers enjoy impunity in these
cases. This was stated during the presentation of its world report in Cairo.

The communications director for HRW, Emma Daly, said
President Felipe Calderon is using the military to fight drug traffickers and
organized crime, but the military are not well trained to carry out policing
and go unpunished when there are abuses. "We have evidence that violence
has increased in Mexico horribly in recent years and that there is no system
for judging the military so that there is justice," Daly said at the
headquarters of the Union of Journalists of the Egyptian capital.

In her opinion, "there is total impunity for the
military in Mexico," who are never prosecuted within the military justice
system, which encourages the continuation of "the abuse because there is
no way to stop it."

According to the NGO report, the efforts of the authorities
to combat organized crime have led to a significant rise in killings, torture
and other abuses by security forces, which only make the "climate of
disorder and fear worse in some areas of the country." Among the
violations of human rights by the Armed Forces are murder, torture and forced
disappearances.

A demonstration that soldiers who have committed human
rights violations against civilians are never brought to justice is, according
to HRW, that the military prosecutor's office opened over 3,600 investigations
of cases between 2007 and June 2011 and only 15 soldiers were convicted in that
period.

The main victims of these attacks are journalists, human
rights defenders and migrants. Regarding journalists, the report stresses that
this group is "more and more often targeted for violence and
intimidation" and records that between 2000 and September 2011, 74
journalists were killed, eight of them last year. In addition, HRW notes that
hundreds of thousands of migrants who cross Mexico each year suffer serious abuses,
including sexual and physical assault.

The document also emphasizes that the Mexican judicial
system "fails to do justice to these victims of violent crimes or
violations of human rights." One of the major violations, according to the
report, is the torture of detainees, a problem that is perpetuated because some
judges accept confessions extracted under pressure.

The organization also criticized the laws of the country
which, in its opinion, do not adequately protect women and girls from domestic violence
and sexual abuse."

13 killed, 8 at
funeral, in Mexico’s violent southern Guerrero state

AP/Washington Post:
"Police say eight men were killed in an attack on a funeral in a rural
area of Guerrero, part of a death toll of 13 over the weekend in the southern
state plagued by drug violence."

Government of
Guerrero investigating 24 public employees for the death of students

CNN Mexico:
"At least 24 public officials in Guerrero state are being investigated for
their alleged role in the confrontation on December 12 between police and
students from the rural normal school in
Ayotzinapa, which caused the deaths of two students and an employee of a gas
station.

The investigation seeks to determine the administrative
penalties "corresponding to the degree of participation" of the civil
servants, said Julio Cesar Hernandez Martinez, comptroller general of Guerrero,
located southwest of Mexico.

"These responsibilities are related to failing to
provide assistance to those threatened by danger or who have been victims of
crime, and for not having acted with the necessary determination to
prevent immediate and irreparable
serious harm, and having used firearms
unnecessarily " said Hernandez
Martinez .

... The comptroller said officials being investigated
tolerated and even performed acts of torture or cruel actions, and did not use
the protocol for taking detainees into custody during the dislodging of the
protesters on December 12."

Drug trade, not a
lack of food, the biggest problem in the mountains of Chihuahua: local priest

La Jornada:
"Though it is very serious, the greatest crisis in this part of the
Tarahumara Mountains in Chihuahua is not the food shortage, but the presence of
narcotrafficking and its quota of violence: “the Rarámuri communities are being
crucified by organized crime.”

In an interview, the pastor of the village of Creel and
general vicar of the diocese, Hector Fernando Martinez, who has worked in the
area for 17 years tending to 39 communities, vehemently repeats himself. This
past Wednesday he reminded Governor Cesar Duarte of that fact at a public event
in the community of San Ignacio organized to distribute emergency food that the
state government had delivered to respond to the food shortage in Tarahumara.

The presence of narcotrafficking – explains Martinez – has
devastating results for the community’s social structure, “because it uproots
people from their land, displaces them from their houses, and--out of
fear--they stop farming or altogether abandon their towns.” At the same time,
in the face of unemployment and a lack of options, “it attracts young Rarámuri
people and teenagers because it offers them work, encourages them to join; it
provides an income.” Seduced by this life, teenagers and young people, who
range between ages 16 and 20, end up rejecting their identity.

The middle-aged priest, a jovial character who translated
the Hebrew Bible into Rarámuri, doesn’t speak of rumors; he knows it, he’s seen
it, he’s lived it. Today, many of those who pass through Creel and the
surrounding towns in trucks with tinted windows, music turned all the way up,
and “armed to the teeth,” attended catechism with him when they were children.

He admits that the situation hurts and frustrates him: “I
grieve for them, because I know sooner or later they are going to be killed,
and it frustrates me because life in the Tarahumara Mountains, the expectations
it gives them, it’s very little. For them, the gun, the truck, the money is
more important in order to feel powerful.”

“Bless our weapons, father.”

He tells of this past December 12, when a group of them
stopped him when he was travelling from one town to another. They asked him to
bless their weapons: “I refused outright; I told them: ‘I will bless you, if
you’d like, that God may care for you and so that you don’t use them, but I
will not bless them.’” They insisted, “Come on, father. In the movie ‘El
Infierno’ they bless guns. Plus we’re not the ones who are extorting money;
we’re just in it for the work!

They let him go, but later on stopped him again: “They told
me ‘Get out (of your car), we want you to try our weapons.’” They weren’t
AK-47’s, they were grenades launchers: “I told them, I am on my way out of the
community; people are gathered in my church, if you shoot they’re going to get
scared, it’s not worth it, guys. Then it occurred to me to tell them that it
was the Day of the Virgin of Guadalupe and that I still had people to baptize.
So they let me go.”

Those kinds of experiences don’t make Hector Fernando
Martinez feel threatened or fearful: “the truth is I’ve never been threatened;
I’ve told them that we’re not going to refuse them access to the church when
one of them passes on, but we’re not going to hold a mass, because we don’t
want to be part of the narcocorrido (ballad).” He said, “One time an important
narco from here was killed and they brought him to the church; they made a
narcocorrido about him and the town cried and they rang the bells; you become
part of it. We don’t want to let that happen.”

The problem of insecurity in Creel can’t be attributed
solely to the presence of armed groups. The more difficult problem is that the
town finds itself in the middle of a fight: on one side is the La Línea cartel
and on the other the Sinaloa cartel. Creel is, as it’s always been, the
battlefield.

One of the few remedies the priest has devised to respond to
the situation is sports, particularly soccer (the locals root for C.D.
Guadalajara). However, Creel has nothing more than a hard court for fast
soccer: “we’ve gone door to door, we’ve told the government that we urgently
need places for the kids because they don’t have anything to do and, obviously,
the hitmen come into Creel with their guns and the kids look up to them, and
despite that, there’s no official program, no strategy to counter it.”

Outsiders can only note the obvious: the furtive glances in
the passenger busses that make the four and a half hour trip from the capital
of Chihuahua to Creel; the stories of the burrito street vendor in a small town
who – without anyone asking – admits that he once sold pirated goods on the
street until the organized crime syndicates started to charge high protection
fees; the truck drivers with tinted glass who slow down and ride along next to
those who seem like strangers or out-of-towners.

Against this background, the pastor of Creel has a
conviction that he calmly expresses: we’re not going to let them intimidate
us.”

'Blind mules'
unknowingly ferry drugs across the U.S.-Mexico border

CNN.com:
"Juan Andres was one of at least five so-called "blind mules"
identified in a 20-page federal complaint who were used by cartels to traffic
drugs.

Others include a fourth-grade teacher and a sports medicine
doctor. The blind mules had a few things in common: The bags were all secured
the same way, each contained roughly the same amount of marijuana, and most of
those caught drove a Ford."

EFE/CNN Mexico:
The Nobel Peace Prize winner, Jody Williams, denounced impunity regarding
crimes against women in Mexico and the lack of political will to find solutions.

After meeting with a group of 50 activists who fight for
collective rights of women, the American criticized the "nice words"
from the government and demanded
"real" solutions to a problem that she said affects the entire
population. "There is no time for excuses. Families who are suffering in
this country want to see action and women who have been raped by the police and
military want to see justice," she said.

According to her, joint action by civil society that demands
responses from the government is necessary to reverse this situation. "No
one person can change society; it has to be a whole community that goes into
action," she said. Therefore, the unity that associations of victims have
been showning in reporting cases of disappearances, rapes and murders across
the country she considers to be a positive sign.

She also stated that one of the main obstacles to achieving
justice and an end to impunity in Mexico is the high number of people involved
in these crimes.

Accompanied by Lisa VeneKlasen, director of Just Associates,
an international feminist organization, and Imelda Marrufo, of the Women's
Network in Ciudad Juarez, Williams stated that, despite the oppression and
dangers, there is hope. "This problem requires a constant struggle if we
want to see a society in which we can live without fear," she said.

Her visit is part of an investigation being carried out by
the Nobel Prize winner Rigoberta Menchú regarding murders of women in Mexico,
Honduras and Guatemala. It began Saturday and ends on January 31. The activists
are scheduled to go tomorrow to the state of Guerrero for a meeting with women
and on Tuesday to meet with diplomats and women who hold high positions in
Mexican political life and the judicial system.

The objectives of the visit is to make visible the role,
contribution and actions that women have taken to eradicate violence and
insecurity in the country and to urge the Mexican government to ensure the
protection of human rights defenders.

During 2010, in Mexico about 3,100 women were killed, while
in Honduras it amounted to about 1,500 between 2008 and 201, and in Guatemala
over 5,000 women died in the last 10 years in a violent way.

Activist Williams won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1997 for her
intense struggle for the prohibition and removal of landmines."

Twitter: @TimothyEWilson

Email: lapoliticaeslapolitica [at] gmail [dot] com

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4 comments:

you must invade now, or it ill get bad, i know u hae all planed for the goods here, also me, but beleive me u wont be able, eduardo saint martin lived in paris and still live there, it is veeery bad, pls invade at this moment, cus babies and normal people are dying fo the worse, loneliness, and help me, pls

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Podcast: Notes From The Underground

In the podcast Notes From The Underground TE Wilson discusses historical and contemporary attitudes toward crime. Each episode features a one-on-one interview that explores a unique topic. Interviewees include authors, experts, and individuals with personal experiences of crime. These podcasts were originally broadcast through the facilities of Trent Radio in Peterborough, Canada.

Mezcalero, a Detective Sánchez novel

Bicultural and transgender, detective Ernesto Sánchez seeks a missing Canadian woman on Mexico’s Pacific coast. Moving uneasily in a world where benign tourism co-exists with extreme violence, he becomes a pawn in a shadowy power-play between corrupt police and drug cartels. Forced to make hard choices – desperate, wounded, and friendless – Sánchez takes refuge in the lawless mountains of Oaxaca. And discovers his fate.

“Wilson’s Mezcalero is a real-pager turner…While the milieu of Wilson’s novel is reminiscent of the hard-boiled tradition, his creation of P.I. Ernesto Sánchez is original, and helps Wilson push the boundaries with respect to genre. Sánchez is a hard-hitting private eye, but Wilson also depicts him as struggling with many of the issues that transgender individuals typically face; in this manner, Wilson creates both a riveting mystery and timely story about navigating life as a gender nonconforming individual.”

“Mezcalero is a remarkable read, with sustained suspense, surprise explosions of poetry and violence, and some new answers to old questions...Wilson understands something about violence and gender that I have never encountered before: that women’s violence is perhaps the most feared. Sanchez’s womanly violence in his manly body is a mystery revealed, a truth told that we suspected all along. This is a profoundly feminist book. The women in the book are the power brokers, the activators of action; even the most oppressed empleada is a container of her own complete power. Mezcalero is deftly plotted, and deploys an acrobatic narrative that is, frankly, exhilarating. Sanchez has a lot to teach us. Wilson, too.”

Janette Platana, author of A Token of My Affliction (2015 Frank O’Connor International Short Story Prize; 2016 English Language Trilium Book Award finalist).

“T.E. Wilson’s Mezcalerois, as a novel, a tacit consequence of the author’s real-world work as a reporter/journalist in Mexico. His work is rich in essence, and rich in detail, of how widespread organized crime and corruption permeate Mexican society. Highly recommended. This is great, well-grounded fiction.”

Dr. Edgardo Buscaglia, Senior Research Scholar in Law and Economics, Columbia University, and President of the Citizens’ Action Institute (Instituto de Acción Ciudadana).

“T.E. Wilson has crafted a terrific, terrifying and yet sensationally witty portrait of modern Mexico. Detective Sánchez is irresistible. You won’t soon forget his journey through that unpredictable jungle that is Mexico today.”